Citing an as-yet unpublished filing with the court, the AP said that the Justice Department now has no objection to the court releasing redacted versions of its opinion, omitting classified data.

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed suit in November (PDF) asking the FISC to publish its opinions regarding the collection program and Section 215 of the PATRIOT Act, under which the government claims authority to collect the data. Earlier this month, the Justice Department had filed a motion to deny the ACLU's request.

"The ACLU's motion should be dismissed because this Court and the Government have already released declassified versions of the opinions that the government has determined are responsive to the ACLU's motion after the Government conducted a classification review with the objective to release as much information as possible consistent with national security," the Justice Department said in its original December 6, 2013 filing (PDF).

A new review, the government said, would just duplicate the one they had already done. The Justice Department has now dropped that objection, perhaps in response to other suits against the bulk data collection.

The ACLU also has a separate suit (ACLU v. Clapper et al), in which it is asking a federal judge to declare the entire program unlawful, halt it, and purge all related records—admittedly a tall order.

However that suit may have better chances given that on December 16, US District Court Judge Richard Leon published an opinion finding that the bulk data collection was unconstitutional, a decision that almost certainly will be heard on appeal by higher courts.

Sean Gallagher
Sean is Ars Technica's IT and National Security Editor. A former Navy officer, systems administrator, and network systems integrator with 20 years of IT journalism experience, he lives and works in Baltimore, Maryland. Emailsean.gallagher@arstechnica.com//Twitter@thepacketrat

I don't necessarily mind redaction, so long as it's details rather than meat.

I mean, if they want to redact Joe Smith's name from the statement "Metadata search algorithm was written June 16 2013 by Joe Smith", that doesn't really impact the value of the statement at this time: we need to know that the algorithm was written, not by whom. We can always get the details later.

It just remains to be seen how important the redactions are. I mean, if they redact "not" from the statement "It is the view of this court that widespread, warrantless metadata collection is not legal under the Constitution of the United States", that's a bit more important. (And no, I don't think they'd be quite that transparent about their manipulation. They're not transparent about anything else, so why would they set a bad precedent? /rimshot)

I'm still amazed at the notion that a government court decision could ever be anything but a matter of the public record, accepting that of course some redactions might be necessary. I can almost imagine it for delicate matters of the reputation of children, that would make sense. But courts making decisions about OUR government? It's bizarro world, a strange absurdist parody of a sound civil society.

Look, I know we're all used to this stuff now. That's why it's important to step back and really think about the perspective.

Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, and others have been pushing the federal government to make the FISA rulings public. My guess is that if the Obama govt is listening to anyone, it's likely them.

As much as I love ACLU, I don't think they are big enough to matter. Which is unfortunate.

Try explaining that to Richard & Mildred Loving, who objected to Virginia's law against interracial marriage and went to the ACLU for help. The Supreme Court responded with the Loving v. Virginia decision, which struck down not only Virginia's law but every other state's laws against interracial marriage.

Many people alive today would never have been born if the ACLU had no power to change the US.

That's only one example. I'm very proud to be a card-carrying member of the ACLU.

Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple, and others have been pushing the federal government to make the FISA rulings public. My guess is that if the Obama govt is listening to anyone, it's likely them.

As much as I love ACLU, I don't think they are big enough to matter. Which is unfortunate.

Try explaining that to Richard & Mildred Loving, who objected to Virginia's law against interracial marriage and went to the ACLU for help. The Supreme Court responded with the Loving v. Virginia decision, which struck down not only Virginia's law but every other state's laws against interracial marriage.

Many people alive today would never have been born if the ACLU had no power to change the US.

That's only one example. I'm very proud to be a card-carrying member of the ACLU.

I agree with you, the ACLU is an important organization that has shaped history as we know it. And while some decisions handed down by lawsuits initiated by the ACLU seem to be odd on the face, when one really looks at the meaning behind the decisions it makes sense and the US, if not the world, becomes a much better place.

I don't necessarily mind redaction, so long as it's details rather than meat.

I mean, if they want to redact Joe Smith's name from the statement "Metadata search algorithm was written June 16 2013 by Joe Smith", that doesn't really impact the value of the statement at this time: we need to know that the algorithm was written, not by whom. We can always get the details later.

It just remains to be seen how important the redactions are. I mean, if they redact "not" from the statement "It is the view of this court that widespread, warrantless metadata collection is not legal under the Constitution of the United States", that's a bit more important. (And no, I don't think they'd be quite that transparent about their manipulation. They're not transparent about anything else, so why would they set a bad precedent? /rimshot)

The trouble is from the previously released opinions, its been exactly that sort of self serving/cover your ass type of redactions that they have done. Most of the meat gets hidden, which is why the ACLU asked for a review and release of more of the documents. Its also been shown that they don't seem to keep a record of what is redacted as one group will get a document with something redacted and another group will get the same document with that info in the clear. If it was that important you'd think it'd be in a database somewhere and consistently applied.

Anytime they can use the excuse of "National Security" they have whether it was or not, it is just such a convenient excuse and eliminates them having to answer questions. At the same time the FISA court has allowed them to get away with it.

…Since when has the Department of Justice been “the US” and “the government”?

Generalizing the DOJ as “the Administration” would be sensible, but the Administration isn’t the government and it sure as hell isn’t the US.

The DOJ is the government's law firm. They fall under the Executive Branch, which manages the US government and implements laws and policies as set by Congress. I think you need to retake Civics 101.

The executive branch is not the sum total of the government, so saying the actions of DOJ are representative of the will of the whole government is absurd. Further, the government's intentions may not align with the intentions of significant portions of the population (if not the majority of the population in cases), so conflating the government with the US is also problematic (that is, the United States, depending on context, can refer to the people, the government, the states (recursively - their people, government, or subdivisions), or any combination thereof, and possibly all combinations at once).

…Since when has the Department of Justice been “the US” and “the government”?

Generalizing the DOJ as “the Administration” would be sensible, but the Administration isn’t the government and it sure as hell isn’t the US.

The people who are voting you down, who apparently do believe that the government IS the US, are the largest part of the reason we have the problems we do. People don't know, or don't want the responsibility of knowing, that the people are the US, and the government are merely the servants we hire to clean the toilets and sweep the floors.

It's more comfortable to believe the government is in charge, though. It eliminates that pesky personal responsibility and opens the possibility that some day mommy gov't will take care of you.

And yet I look forward to them stating this was already about to happen, and Edward Snowden had nothing to do with it

Obama already pulled that card a couple months back. Evidently he was totally planning to release some of this information in order to have a public debate on the subject. Evidently what Snowden did was both completely unnecessary because Obama already going to release the information, but also incredibly damaging to national security because none of it should ever have been brought to light.